The Tangled Bridge

by Rhodi Hawk

  Everyone went hushed. Patrice realized that Trigger was telling Rosie in the briar what he wanted her to say, and she let her physical body repeat his words. Easier for him than trying to speak through pigeonry. Rosie was already in his world.

  Gil appeared, crawling around the other side of the automobile. He used his hands to creep on his belly like a snake, his legs trailing behind him. He too was covered in sores and ragged skin, and his coloring looked near blue.

  “Gil, honey,” Patrice said, and she pulled her younger sister in his direction, Rosie’s feet bouncing along the grass.

  Ferrar reached down and hefted Marie-Rose up from Patrice’s grasp, and Patrice staggered over to put her arms around Gil. He settled at her touch the way a dog might lean against someone’s knee.

  From where Ferrar was now holding her, Marie-Rose spoke again in that same monotone. “What are you tryin, Maman? You tryin to keep us all or kill us all, and I ain’t figured out which. But you made a deal with me and I paid my end. So now you pay yours.”

  Marie-Rose paused the monotone voice and asked more naturally, “What was the deal?”

  Patrice looked around at the brush, the grass, the gravel road. Somewhere beneath this veneer Trigger was nearby. Maybe standing right beside her, like Ferrar was. To know that he was not dead now, Patrice couldn’t bear the thought of losing him to the blackness. What would it do to his heart, his soul, his mind, to spend so much time with the river devils?

  Patrice said, “Trigger, honey, you listen good. Never you mind. You hear me? I’ll go along with Maman.”

  Marie-Rose spoke Trigger’s words. “She got me already, Patrice. My body’s lost. My mind barely here.”

  Then Rosie fell to whispering, and Patrice couldn’t make out what she was saying any more. Gil whispered, too.

  Patrice said, “I’m the oldest. I’m the one she wants, and I’ll go.”

  She turned to look at her mother. “But you heal these two and let them alone, and let Trigger alone. I’ll give you everything I have, Maman. You can have what I am.”

  Ferrar whispered, “You gotta know that can’t be, Patrice. Let Trigger have his way.”

  Gil’s whispers grew loud, and it sounded like he was talking to Trigger.

  Patrice said to her mother, “Quick, get it over with!”

  Maman stepped toward her. Patrice looked at her mother’s hand and saw some kind of raptor’s talon.

  “You do it you die!” Marie-Rose cried out.

  And then she was weeping and pleading in her own words. “Don’t go, Trig. And not Patrice. I’ll go. I’m gone already.”

  Gil spoke. “Rosie won’t say what Trigger wants her to, so I’ll just say it. We all know that if Patrice goes with Maman, she’ll just let herself die in there. She’ll hold her faith against the river devils and waste away.”

  Maman said, “You all waste my time. Patrice will come with me or all of you die.”

  Through her tears, Rosie spoke in that monotone that meant she was speaking for Trigger again. “Here’s what happens. I keep my body. I live out in the woods the way I like it. You can have my mind anytime you need it. I’m better at finding things than the three of them combined and you know it. And I’m a lot more in step with the river devils than Patrice will ever be. I’m already half devil. If you take Patrice, you will not live out the day. I promise you that, Maman. You think I ain’t got skills but I got enough, I do.”

  Patrice shouted at her mother. “I’m the one who’s going to kill you if you don’t take me in right now. Right now!”

  Gil said, “If she takes you, Patrice, they gonna kill Ferrar. And Maman will wind up with all of us. You can’t stop her, but Trigger can cuz she can’t have his body now. Let him do it.”

  Patrice looked at Ferrar, knowing what Gil said was true, that Ferrar wouldn’t survive this. Was Gil speaking for Trigger or for himself? It seemed he was pulling toward the surface of the briar.

  “Come on, Patrice, let’s go,” Ferrar said.

  He hoisted Rosie over his shoulder like a sack of rice and was trying to lift Gil. Patrice pulled Gil upward. She looked at her mother. Mother was nodding at Jacob Chapman. Before Patrice could stop him, Chapman lunged at Ferrar.

  “Stop!” Patrice cried.

  But too late, something was protruding from Ferrar’s neck. It looked like a cactus spine. As Patrice reached for him, she felt a sharp stab. She turned and saw her mother. And then Patrice felt a cactus spine protruding from just below her own jaw, blood weeping its way down toward her neck.

  Her mother swayed, or maybe it was Patrice who swayed, and then Patrice was falling. She tangled with Gil. Ferrar went down, too, she saw. Rosie, Gil, Ferrar, Patrice, all writhing on the grass like braided snakes. Jacob Chapman was down, too, facedown. Had she herself done that to him?

  She felt her blood turning to cotton.

  She opened her mouth, thinking she might take a breath, a sip of water, but instead her lips formed around the name: “Trigger.”

  * * *

  WHEN PATRICE AWOKE, SHE was in a boat with Marie-Rose, Gilbert, and Ferrar, and she thought: “I am dead. We are all dead.”

  But that wasn’t so.

  Patrice could see that Ferrar’s chest was rising and falling in easy breaths. And as she stirred, she saw first Marie-Rose and then Gilbert turn and look at her.

  “Oh, for God!” Patrice said, and she threw her arms around her brother and sister.

  They held onto one another and wept. Patrice felt rummy. This seemed like a dream, but then she remembered the cactus spine her mother had used to stick her. Her hand went to the scabbed-over welt at her neck. This was real alright. Her brother and sister were here with her.

  And Tatie Bernadette, too. She was leaning against a barrel and looking at Patrice with her mouth in an O. Her body was awkward as though she wasn’t sure whether to join the LeBlanc children or turn away.

  Patrice said, “Tatie, I’ve missed you so!”

  It seemed all she needed to hear. Tatie Bernadette joined them, and encircled Patrice with her arms as Patrice encircled Rosie and Gil.

  Tatie said, “Ma p’tite. I’ve been waiting to tell you I was wrong.”

  Patrice said nothing, just leaned into her and drank in her safe, soft hug.

  Rosie wept into Patrice’s shoulder. “Trigger’s gone. He’s gone with Maman for good.”

  Patrice patted her, stroked her hair, stroked Gilbert’s hair. They were alive, alive, alive.

  “Y’all, you got the poison in you,” she said.

  Gilbert shook his head. “Not anymore. She gave us something to clean our blood. Already feel better.”

  Ferrar lay stretched next to her in the hull. He was very still, his eyes closed. She reached for him and found he was breathing easily in sleep.

  “He’s alright,” Gilbert said.

  And Rosie said, “Don’t worry, we didn’t kill him.”

  Patrice gave her sister a queer, uneasy look. It would be a while before they recuperated from the briar way. All that time spent in the company of river devils.

  Gilbert said, “Maman just gave him a sleeping scratch. You, too. She figured y’all would keep her from getting Trigger otherwise.”

  Gil and Rosie were both still very sick but they had all their wits about them. They looked gawdawful of course. She wondered if they knew how much time had passed since that day when they left Terrefleurs. Whether they’d seen themselves in a mirror yet. She herself had not.

  Patrice looked ahead and saw the backs of two men at the helm.

  “Who’s manning this boat?”

  “Hutch and Simms.”

  “Oh.”

  And from behind they did indeed looked like Hutch and Simms. A third man stood up there with them, probably the one who owned the boat. Patrice looked around at the massive net and booms and decided it must be a shrimp boat. And it was laden with barrels of hooch or something. Heavy in the water.

  The sun was hanging low but the air felt too
fresh to be evening, so she guessed it must be late morning. She turned her head so as to shield the glare from the water. The boat sped past swamplands.

  Where was Trigger?

  She looked at Ferrar as he lay there. Still too dangerous for her to slip into the briar and see Trig with Ferrar here. Even if Maman was truly going to let them all alone, the river devils would take notice and do their hating.

  It turned her stomach to think of Trigger. There had to be some way to get him out and keep them all safe once and for all. There had to be.

  She watched the men up ahead at the wheel, talking and laughing and uninterested in the LeBlanc children and Ferrar. Probably Simms was anxious to get access to Bayou Bouillon for trading, and worried that Ferrar wouldn’t survive long enough to hold up his end of the bargain and put in the good word with Francois. How foreign that seemed to Patrice. Never worrying whether loved ones were going to wake up in the morning occupying their own bodies, or heaven above, or hell below, or some dark corner of the shadow river that ran between the two.

  She held on tight to Rosie and Gil. It felt so good to hold them, bodies and minds and ghosts all together in the same place.

  sixty-seven

  LOUISIANA, NOW

  ETHAN FINISHED STRAPPING THE camera around the kudzu-choked tree with green Velcro tape and said to Bo, “Turn around ten times as fast as you can.”

  Bo spread his hands and turned in a circle, his chin dropping to his chest, and he called out with each turn, “One, two, three…”

  They were at Terrefleurs, Madeleine’s old family property, the only place Ethan could think of to take the boys and hide. A few days ago he’d made the mistake of letting Bo’s neighbor Cheryl and her son Ray meet him at his lab in Tulane to drop off Bo’s schoolwork. That’s when Oyster had shown up, and Cheryl had shot herself. Now she was gone, and her son Ray, wheelchair-bound and deaf, had not another living relative in this world.

  Cheryl had had lots of friends—she’d been a very kind and well-loved soul—but no blood relatives. Ray had nowhere to go. And it was clear that his life was in danger, too. Ethan understood now that anyone who’d spent an extended amount of time in Bo’s company had become a target. Before she’d disappeared, Madeleine had told Ethan about “the stain” and what it meant to Zenon and the others.

  “Eight … nine … ten.”

  Bo didn’t actually make it all the way to ten spins. He’d fallen over dizzy at nine and did the final turn on his bottom in the grass.

  “Now tell me where she is,” Ethan said.

  Bo clicked. “That way.”

  He was pointing out beyond the cabins toward the bayou behind Terrefleurs. Ethan stared in that direction. South and to the west.

  Ray watched Bo in silence.

  The surprise was that getting temporary custody of Ray hadn’t been that difficult. Ray would have gone straight to a special-care orphanage, but Ethan had gone to school with a guy who acted as a liaison with child protective services, and he made some calls. Ethan was allowed to act as Ray’s legal custodian until a court hearing would determine Ray’s long-term future.

  Really, now that Cheryl was gone, it seemed that Bo was the only friend Ray had. There were lots of people who were kind to him. But Ray and Bo had been inseparable for years. Ray needed his friend now more than ever.

  Here at Terrefleurs, Ethan thought it not only easier to hide the boys, he could protect them better, too. The place had limited access so if anyone came here Ethan had lots of warning.

  “You still feel dizzy?” Ethan asked Bo.

  “Little bit.”

  “OK, rest a minute or two.”

  Bo flopped onto his back.

  Ethan picked up the transmitter, then waved his hand in front of the little camera now hidden in the kudzu. As soon as he waved the transmitter lit up and displayed an image of Ethan with Ray sitting just behind him in the chair.

  It was a start.

  Basic motion-activated surveillance equipment, nothing fancy, which was good because Ethan wasn’t an electrician and didn’t dare call anyone out to the property. He’d actually entertained the idea of setting booby traps but had no idea where to begin. Surveillance was a start. If anyone were to sneak onto Terrefleurs, Ethan would be aware of it.

  “Can I see?” Ray said.

  Ethan handed him the transmitter, and Ray examined the screen.

  “OK, I’m better,” Bo said.

  “Do it again.”

  Bo hopped to his feet and started to spin in a circle again. “One … two … three…”

  “You should do that big white house, too,” Ray said.

  “You think so?” Ethan said, making sure Ray could see his mouth as he spoke. Ethan wasn’t great with sign language but Ray was a pretty good lip reader.

  “It’s a good place to hide for bad guys,” Ray said.

  Ray had no idea how right he was. Before Zenon had become paralyzed, the Terrefleurs main house was where he’d killed at least one of his victims. Aside from that, the old structure had pretty much been taken over by racoons and rats and vines and whatever other soldiers Mother Nature kept in her army. The main house was falling apart—the roof had caved in at places, and the whole thing smelled of rot.

  Needless to say, Ethan and the boys were not staying in there. Ethan had set them up instead in two of the old workers’ cabins. They, too, were old, but they were surprisingly sturdy and it hadn’t taken much to clear them out for camping.

  Still, it seemed one camera in the main house might be a prudent move.

  Ethan turned back to Ray. “You’re probably right. I’ll put one in there.”

  Bo made it to ten and did his clicks, then pointed. “She’s that way.”

  They’d done it four times already and no matter how dizzy and disoriented Bo was after spinning around blind, each time he clicked for Madeleine he was still pointing in the same direction.

  “You sure,” Ethan said.

  “Yes, I’m sure.”

  The trouble was, the direction Bo was pointing was just that; a direction. Even if Bo was right, there’d be no telling whether Madeleine was hidden five miles, fifty miles, or five hundred miles in that direction.

  If Bo was right.

  Because he wasn’t clicking for her the way he might click to “see” a car, or a person, or a tree. Bo was clicking in the way he used to sense when “a devil’s nearby,” as Bo put it. Bo said he thought he recognized the sense of Madeleine. He thought so. Maybe.

  And the thing about Bo’s sense, it apparently worked as the crow flies. He knew the direction only. He didn’t actually know how to get there. And Bo had been pointing out into the wilds. That meant beyond Terrefleurs, into the bayou, to the shore on the other side of the bayou, continuing across various landmasses and waterways for who knew how long. A truck was no good. Hiking was fine until you hit the water, at which point Ethan would need a boat, and that would only be useful until the next landmass.

  Ethan had actually gone so far as to persuade one of his old buddies to loan him a Four Winns (a called-in favor plus the promise of free consultations). So they now had the Four Winns to concentrate their search for Madeleine, but they still faced the difficulty of navigating alternating swamp and dry land. Ethan couldn’t very well transport the Four Winns overland in wild swamp.

  “You want me to do it again?” Bo said.

  “Yeah,” Ethan said, and Bo gave a tired sigh before Ethan added, “But not here.” He went to his car and took out his map of the area, then drew a long straight line from Terrefleurs to the gulf in the southwesterly direction Bo had been indicating.

  Ethan waved the boys at the car. “Come on, guys. We’re going for a drive.”

  sixty-eight

  LOUISIANA, NOW

  MADELEINE LISTENED AS GASTON told her about when he was seventeen, when his life changed forever. He and his brother and sisters had hidden themselves in the fishing village-cum-rogue hideaway. When he was attacked he all but died in that
water. Blacked out and found himself in the root system of the tree. It took him ages to find his way out. Time stopped making sense to him.

  “Not long after I got stabbed my mother found me here,” Gaston said.

  “Chloe.”

  He nodded. “She ain’t come to see me in person, no she didn’t. Used her voodoo. I come to believe, the river magic only go so far here on earth. But down there, down in the briar patch, it really means something.”

  “You saw her then?”

  “No, ain’t seen my mother in real life since 1927 or thereabouts. The thing that comes to see me is part witch, part devil, and something else.”

  “The coldness.”

  He nodded. “Seems like a terrible thing, but you can use that coldness to your advantage. Sometimes you got to do things you don’t have the heart to do.”

  “What happened when Chloe found you?”

  “Well she put my sorry mess to work, that’s all. My mother, as far back as I can recall, all she ever wanted was to get at them secrets. Pickin berries from the bramble, we used to call it. Trouble was, they’s so many traps in there. It’s a terrible place.”

  She thought of the sylphs and the thornflies, the creature in that oily slick. The healing fissure had been an anomaly.

  Gaston went on. “So my mother, she and I struck a deal. She’d leave my brother and sisters alone. All I had to do was anything she asked.”

  Madeleine felt her throat going dry. She’d had her guesses but to hear Gaston say it, the full stark light of truth—it seemed unthinkable.

  “So the life you knew essentially ended then, when you were stabbed?”

  Gaston’s voice grew very quiet. “In the old days they called them zombies. Always pictured some powder-faced ghoul. Something like what we pretended on the farm at All Hallows when we were children.”

  He swallowed hard, his Adam’s apple bobbing in the predawn glow. “But that’s what I am, a living voodoo zombie. Can’t find my way to death. Just a slave. I use that cold wind whenever I need to blow any warmth from my soul, and then it’s easier.”

  “Why haven’t you aged?”

  “Same way you figured out the healing. Pickin berries from the briar. I kept it hidden for a long, long time. Thought sooner or later my mother would let me go, or she’d die. And then I’d pick up my life right where I left it. Same age and ever-thing. Ain’t that foolish, now isn’t it? Nothing’s changed in over eighty years.